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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24878830">A Resolution in Denial</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/pariahsdream/pseuds/pariahsdream'>pariahsdream</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Somedays [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616, Scarlet Spider (Comics)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Implied/Referenced Abuse, Introspection, Light Angst, M/M, Sequel, Sexual Confusion</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 10:47:25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>960</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24878830</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/pariahsdream/pseuds/pariahsdream</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Companion to "Waiting". Kaine can say no now but someday he might not want to.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kaine (Spider-Man)/Flash Thompson</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Somedays [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1800184</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Resolution in Denial</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Blame <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Traincat">Traincat</a> and <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/pommenade">Pommenade</a>. They tricked me into angsting!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Kaine knows Flash wants to touch him. It pours out of his skin like the embodiment of yearning. It doesn’t feel invasive though; Kaine does understand people wanting him like - like that. It’s the only way he’s ever <i>been</i> wanted. </p><p>What is confusing is that Flash waits. </p><p>Why? Why doesn’t he push? Why doesn’t he demand what other people have? What other people expected? Why did he wait all this time?</p><p>Louise hadn’t. She took him the night they met in that dank bar in Salt Lake. She guided him between her thighs and demanded he touch her- make her come. </p><p>Kaine had never done anything like it before. He told her so and she’d laughed that husky, cynical laugh of hers and said that at least this time she was only doing half the work instead of all of it. He’d come quickly, startled, and she made him keep going, putting his hands on her, telling him exactly how she wanted him to touch her until he was hard again. </p><p>It had been the most transcendent experience in his life. Except-</p><p>...except when he reached for her when they were done she laughed again, pushing his hand back. She didn’t look at him and it felt like his soul was shut out of heaven. </p><p>Perhaps that should have been a warning. </p><p>Maybe what happened with Louise had been a fluke. He had thought Peter and Ben baffling before then, wanting ... that. Kaine’s desires weren’t like theirs. He didn’t look around with heated eyes and see a world out there waiting for him to indulge himself. He didn’t look at soft breasts or calves or small waists. He didn’t want small. He didn’t want soft. Soft could be torn apart. Soft got you hurt. Louise was strong. Her hands tough, calloused. In the dark, on top of him, she was powerful and he didn’t feel terror or shame. </p><p>(Had he <i>wanted</i> though? Had he wanted like Ben did? Was that another way Kaine was flawed?)</p><p>Kaine no longer hurts like he once did, thinking of her. Part of him is certain it’s because he’s not a good man but part of it could be ... well, being better than he had been at the least. He’s never going to be what other people are but there may still be a place for him. Maybe that place is with Flash.</p><p>Flash likes that he tries. He likes that Kaine doesn’t let other monsters prey on people when he can stop it. Flash doesn’t demand that he please him alone and to hell with the rest of the world. He is right there with him, a partner before anything else. </p><p>Shannon had wanted to be his partner. She was drawn to his power. There had been a kinship there however Kaine hated to admit it. She saw a different side of him than Louise had. Shannon saw that he had known the cruelties of powerful men in ways that no one should. She used it. She knew like she knew her own soul and still used it to manipulate him. Kaine’s hated a lot in his life. Sometimes without reason. But she earned it. He could not forgive her anymore than he could forgive the men that made them both into what they were. </p><p>That had been another life, one Kaine didn’t like to think about, or talk about. Flash wasn’t dumb. He could see that there were secrets and scars even beyond Kaine’s flesh. He hadn’t known Kaine then. He didn’t owe Flash anything and maybe that’s why he found himself explaining. Once he had looked exactly as twisted and mangled as he felt inside. Once he had been in pain just by existing. Then he had been given a new body. One that wasn’t broken and diseased. </p><p>Zoe Walsh was beautiful and she’d wanted him. He had no reason to deny her. He hadn’t meant to let it come out quite that way but Flash had looked at him with such gentle understanding. No one had ever looked at Kaine like that before, not even.... He didn’t have to say a word and Kaine knew Flash wouldn’t be angry if Kaine told him no. He had told Flash no a lot. </p><p>No, he didn’t want to work together. </p><p>No, he didn’t have any advice about teenage girls. </p><p>No, he didn’t think they should get dinner after this mission. It wasn’t a mission anyway. </p><p>No, he wasn’t going to come inside Flash’s apartment. He was just passing through, it had nothing to do with Flash <i>at all</i>. </p><p><i>No</i> was something Kaine earned by fierce and bloody determination. <i>No</i> meant he was not anyone’s plaything or pet or son. <i>No</i> meant everything to him. </p><p>But when Flash accepted all the “no’s”, he also accepted Kaine’s body slumped into him into exhaustion. He accepted Kaine’s awkward touch on a forearm. He smiled with delight when Kaine kissed him. </p><p>So why did he still need to say no? Why did it matter that he knew Flash hurt every time but didn’t question it? Kaine wasn’t testing him. He was under no delusion who was the better man between them. Maybe it was because “no” was something Kaine <i>needed</i>, Flash or no Flash. </p><p><i>No</i> was important. It meant that he was a person who had choices. It meant that he could choose to let— to let Flash love him. Or he could try, again and again, to remind him that Kaine was a discard and a reject. That his <i>no</i> was a warning that Flash deserved more than what Kaine could offer even if other words to express why never came. </p><p><i>No</i> sat on his tongue, ready, but what came out was, “Don’t let me go.”</p>
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